The things Quicken Loans team members care about and want to share with the world

Primary Navigation:

Amanda Pallay

After a hard day of herding 5000 head of cattle and chasin’ off rustlers, your only recourse for relaxation is to hit up the town saloon for a frosty brew. You round up your crew and walk on in to Dust Mug Saloon where the barkeep, Patrick Flannigan – Sudsy to his friends and regulars – looks up from polishing his beer mug and nods. Your boys pick a spot at a table, away from the door, and start playing Three-Card Monte. You take out a smoke and sidle up to the bar next to Sudsy.
“Hey, Bill” he says putting down his mug and wiping his hands on his apron.
“Hey, Suds,” you say with a voice that’s full of dust from the trail.
“What’ll it be?”
“What ya got, Suds? It’s been a hell of a day.”
“Name your poison, Bill. We just got a shipment from Laramie – all the best.”

…Wait, what? This isn’t the old West, and you’re not an honest cowboy just tryin’ to get by? Well, shuck my corn, partner! My mistake! I musta got confused, because you know what? Today IS national Name Your Poison day.

Social Bookmarking

It’s no secret that I may possibly have one of the most entertaining kids around. If you’re a regular reader of this here blog, you’re well aware of the fun that is Jude. It seems like such a shame to keep all that awesomeness to myself, which is why I love to share him with everyone.

Jude has just turned 5 and with that comes the glory that is kindergarten. Although he’s currently in preschool, his current class shares a door (and sometimes class time) with the kindergarten class. He knows that’s a big step to go from preschool to kindergarten and asks me every day when it’s his turn to go. Kindergarten is a huge deal to the preschoolers – they’re the “big kids” of the school.

So in honor of my baby who is so eager to be a big kid, I want to say Happy Kindergarten Day!

Social Bookmarking

My son, Jude, is the world’s biggest Star Wars fan. Well, wait. That’s a big claim considering some of the Star Wars fans out there. Ok, he’s at least the world’s biggest 5-year-old Star Wars fan. He’s watched the movies countless times, he visits the 501st Legion every year at the Motor City Comic Con (as seen in this post), he watches the cartoons, and my god, he has toys out the wazoo. Last year, I even went so far as to make a stormtrooper costume for Halloween because in his mind a simple store-bought stormtrooper would NOT do. We spend the drive to and from school discussing why Anakin was overcome by the dark side, why it’s good to be a Jedi, why Boba Fett (his favorite) was a bounty hunter and how he doesn’t think that Boba was necessarily BAD, per se, but misunderstood. Needless to say, the boy loves Star Wars.

Social Bookmarking

Happy World Cosmonauts Day! Or if you prefer, Russian Cosmonaut Day, Yuri’s night or International Day of Human Space Flight.

That’s right, April 12th is the celebration of the first successful manned space flight by Russian cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin in 1961. This year, the United Nations have made it an official resolution, with more than 50 states taking part in drafting the document. However, in Russia, they have been celebrating this day since 1962.

Yuri Gagarin was a 27-year-old cosmonaut who circled the Earth on the Vostok 1 spacecraft before returning successfully – and safely – back to Soviet soil after 1 hour and 48 minutes. Yuri instantly became a national hero of the Soviet Union and a world-famous figure. His accomplishment was celebrated with lavish parades so elaborate and spectacular, they are only overshadowed by the majesty of the Soviet World War II victory parades. Yuri also earned the country’s highest honor, the title of Hero of the Soviet Union.

Social Bookmarking

Through the course of my Wednesday morning blog reading at breakfast, I came across a link to a site named Aidan's Monsters.The brief description said that Aidan has leukemia and is drawing pictures to help raise money for medical bills.

Well, of course me being the giant, weepy ball of sap that I am I clicked right over to that site intending to buy up all of the artwork I could find. Nevermind the fact I have a 4-year-old budding artist at home! Buying some art to help a family is the least I can do – and I love how kids view the world through their giant hearts and imaginations.

Social Bookmarking

As the only mother on the creative team here at Quicken Loans, I often have to turn down a lot of outings and fun Detroit nights out that a lot of my coworkers have. But I’m determined not to let the experience of enjoying Detroit go by the wayside just because I have a kid.

Fortunately, the Compuware building is amazing enough to have a childcare/school facility in the building so I’m able to bring my son, Jude, to work with me, and as a result, expose him as much as I can to this awesome, awesome city.

I’ve been keeping a list of things I want to show him and experience with him in the city and thought I’d share my list with the readers of this blog (in the off chance someone out there might be a parent looking for fun things to do with their kids in the city).

Social Bookmarking

I remember years of my childhood spent at the ballpark watching my dad play baseball. Those days are marked in my mind – the sun on my face, running around under the bleachers, eating as many hot dogs as I wanted and sticky orange Faygo in a glass bottle, the crack of the ball on a wooden bat, my dad's white uniform stained with clay brown dirt from sliding into home.

I remember summer afternoons, my grandpa carrying a small radio in the front pocket of his button down shirts with Ernie Harwell's soothing voice calling out the Detroit Tigers hits and misses. To me, baseball has become synonymous with some of the best memories I can muster, and I'm sure it's the same for thousands of kids – young and old alike – across America.

Social Bookmarking

If there's one thing to know about people from Detroit it's the love we have for our community. We are intensely proud of the products from our fair city – great music, great cars and a really great comic book scene.

I know, I know. Detroit isn't the first place you think of when it comes to comic books. But Detroit has long been home to many successful comic writer/artists including Geoff Johns who writes for DC and Guy Davis who draws for Marvel. There are also several other self-published comic artists who are lauded as tops in the industry like Katie Cook, artist at Starwars.com, and Dave Petersen, the award winning artist and creator of the highly lauded Mouse Guard series.

As for comic cons, most people immediately think San Franscico or New York or Chicago. But really, aren't those old hat by now? Big cities, big names, big deal! Detroit has been a great comic community and has yet remained untarnished by the greedy hands and dirty fingers of the money-grubbing Hollywood types. The Motor City Comic Con is one of the best and largest Midwest comic conventions and has been going strong for more than 20 years.